Edyrn nodded understanding. There was time for no more. The first wave of cavalry smashed into the square with a shock and din that drowned even a man's thoughts.
Each of the pikemen in the first rank, at Blade's orders, had dug a slanting hole in the earth and couched his pike in it. The pikes, twelve feet long and cruelly pointed, thrust outward in a savage picket. Into this came the galloping cavalry of Lycus.
Blade, standing high in his stirrups for a better view, watched the carnage with bitter satisfaction. The slingers and bowmen wrought havoc on the charge and now concentrated on the Samostans who had been dismounted. The war horses, fierce and obedient, ran their bellies onto the pikes and were gutted or went down with broken legs. More came on behind, only to pile up on those dying before them. The charge had broken.
Blade sought for the blue plumes of Lycus in the melee and found him only just in time. The Samostan officer, his mount dying on a pike, leaped agilely to earth and called a group of other dismounted soldiers about him. With his sword he beckoned a solid contingent of his horsemen into a mass attack on a small segment of the square. They came on in a last effort, some twenty horse against two files of pikemen and javelin throwers and bowmen. Ten went down in the effort. Ten broke through, hewing a narrow lane through the square, and Lycus led his impromptu infantry in behind them. These Samostans were all tough and well-disciplined veterans and they knew what to do. They wheeled and faced right and left, fencing off a corridor through the square. A sub-officer on the field began to organize what cavalry was left, and those wandering afoot, and direct them into the channel. Blade watched all this with calm.
The Guard.was now hampered by their numbers and the close quarters. Blade called a halt to sling and bow fire, lest they slay each other, and sent Edym galloping to close the gap on the outer side of the square and contain the Samostan forces beyond it. He spurred to meet Lycus who, with some thirty men behind him, was determinedly hacking his way into the square and certain death. A death that Blade, at the moment, had no intention of giving him.
As Lycus and his little band broke through the square the mounted officers around Blade watched him and waited for his command to ride the Samostans down and slash their to bits. Blade gave no such order. He waited.
After a moment he held up a hand and bellowed a command that all the Guard cease to fight. Bewildered, the sweating and bloody men did so. And stared at Blade.
Lycus also, his sword dripping, his harness battered and slashed and his plumes clipped by a javelin, rested and stared at Blade in amazement
«What now, man? You have had the best of it. I was wrong and did not think your Guard to fight so well. Why do you hold off? I have lost and am dishonored and have nothing left but death. So have on with it. I will never surrender.»
Blade noted that the square had closed, healing the wound, and the remaining Samostans were in full retreat. Edyrn came back and Blade gave him new orders. «These men are prisoners until I say otherwise. No 'man is to fire or attack them. See that all understand this.»
Blade dismounted and walked toward Lycus, where that officer stood with the group of soldiers who had followed him into the square. Blade held up a hand for parley. Lycus, bleeding from a long cut on his cheek, showed his teeth in contempt.
«You want to talk, Blade, when you have us in such a trapl I was wrong-you are no demon. You are an idiot. The first rule of war-«
Blade held up a hand for silence. He ignored Lycus and spoke to the Samostan soldiers clustered around him.
«I am.. Richard Blade. Most of you have heard of my challenge to your leader, Hectoris, but for those who have not I will repeat it now. Listen carefully, and remember, for I intend to free you, with your honor and your weapons, and send you back to Hectoris that you may remind him of these words. Here is my challenge:
«I will light Hectoris on the beach. Man to man, in single combat. I will use shield and sword, nothing more. As for Hectoris, he may be horsed and use any weapons he likes-sword, lance, mace, bow and arrow, I care not. I give him these great odds because I deem him no true warrior and know I can defeat him.»
Lycus was staring. His men gaped and muttered amongst themselves and cast furtive looks at their officer. Blade pressed on.
«You will see the equity of it. Hectoris has all the advantage. If he defeats me your lives are spared, for the war is over. If I defeat him we will talk of terms and I think there will be no war, and again you will be spared. I have no quarrel with common soldiers or with officers who merely obey orders. Why should you die for Hectoris when I offer him terms that nobody but an arrant coward can refuse? And if your leader is a coward it is time you found him out! What say you to all this, Lycus?»
That officer snarled and spat in the dirt. «I say it is a trap for Hectoris, though I know not how you intend to spring it. I say I will have no part of it.» He glanced about him. «And I say that any who listens to this liar, anyone who passes on such talk, is guilty of treason and will pay for it-I will see his bones broken to powder on the wheel.»
Blade sighed inwardly. He was going to fail with Lycus, and it was he most of all that he desired to win. But there was no help for it. He drew his sword, and approached Lycus. Edyrn gave an order and an outer ring of the Guard began to press in. Bowmen and slingers moved into easy range.
Blade halted six paces from Lycus and spoke past him, over him, to the Samostans huddled behind. «This is not your quarrel. Remain out of it and live. I promised you life and your honor and your weapons and you shall have them if you do not interfere.»
Lycus whirled to face his men. «Do not listen to this Blade. I command you die with me.»
Blade waited. The Guard waited and for a moment silence hung like the dust over the battlefield.
Blade said: «Think well, men of Samosta. If I lift a hand you all die. You have fought bravely and have not been dishonored. Why should you die for the likes of Hectoris-will he comfort your wives and sweethearts? Will he provide them with bread and a roof to shelter them? And think you, Lycus, are you not the equal of Hectoris and might not you be elected in his stead if I slay him?»
The Samostans around Lycus stepped back and lowered their weapons. Lycus spat at them and leaped at Blade. «Your tongue is a weapon indeed, Blade. Let us see if your sword matches it.»
The man was determined to die. Blade, even as he took the first ringing blow on his shield, felt the pity of it. He could have used Lycus. But it was worse than that-now he must kill the man and show proof of his prowess at arms. This he had wanted to conceal from Hectoris until the last moment, had wanted the Samostan leader to reckon him nothing but a braggart and a boaster, a man to be held in contempt. That would not work now. He must play the opposite tactic; he must prove himself to these watching Samostans and let them spread the word and so subject Hectoris to a different sort of pressure.
And yet he made a last effort. He fended off the flurry of blows and spoke loud to Lycus. «This is not a fair fight. I am fresh and you are battle weary. Why are you so intent to die, Lycus?»
The officer was already panting, but he bore in and began to force Blade back. Sweat gleamed through the blood on his face and in his beard. His shorn plumes drooped. and there was a great dint in his helmet.
«I swore my faith to Hectoris,» he gasped, «and that oath I will keep. I have failed my mission and I deserve to die, but if I take you with me it will not be total failure.»